Episode 123: The Top 4 Pieces of Home Gym Equipment for Online Coaching, Step Count Targets, Bad Comments Sections, and More…

0:00:11.8 Mike Vacanti: Jordan.

0:00:12.6 Jordan Syatt: Michael.

0:00:13.7 Mike Vacanti: Do you consider yourself a good driver?

[laughter]

0:00:25.9 Jordan Syatt: Well, let’s use the facts. We’ll use the facts here…

0:00:29.5 Mike Vacanti: Let’s use the recent facts.

0:00:32.7 Jordan Syatt: In my entire life…

0:00:35.4 Mike Vacanti: No, no, no, no. [chuckle]

0:00:35.7 Jordan Syatt: Yes, we’re… Hey, facts don’t care about your feelings, Michael. Let’s look at the facts.

0:00:40.3 Mike Vacanti: Okay, Ben.

[laughter]

0:00:44.9 Jordan Syatt: In my entire life, I’ve been in one accident and it was not my fault, ruled legally. A guy T-boned me when he was doing an illegal left turn, I was going through an intersection. Other than that, I have never been in an accident.

0:01:00.0 Mike Vacanti: So a lack of personal responsibility on that one, but keep going.

0:01:02.5 Jordan Syatt: Legally…

0:01:05.5 Mike Vacanti: Not your fault.

0:01:05.6 Jordan Syatt: They proved it. I didn’t do nothing wrong.

0:01:05.7 Mike Vacanti: Victim mindset.

0:01:08.3 Jordan Syatt: I have had my license suspended because I didn’t pay speeding tickets when I was 18 and 19. I got a speeding ticket right before I moved to Israel, and in my head, I was like, “Whatever, I’m moving to Israel, so I’m not gonna… ” This was… I was what? I was 23. I was 23, I think, moved. I’m moving to Israel, I’m ready to go, I’m literally leaving in two days. I get a speeding ticket, and then I say, “I’m not gonna pay it ’cause I’m leaving the country anyway, and I had a one-way ticket.” I was like, “Whatever, it doesn’t matter.” I end up getting a job at Gary, thanks to you. I moved back within 10 months, and then I get pulled over within 48 hours of landing back in the States for speeding again, it’s like 10 o’clock at night, and the cop is like, “Not only were you speeding, you have an outstanding ticket for the past 10 months. Your license is officially suspended.” And I was like, “Okay, well, all right, cool. I’ll just drive, whatever.” He’s like, “No, no, you can’t drive your… It’s suspended as of right now,” and I was like… It’s like 10 o’clock at night, I’m like, “Well, what am I supposed to do?” He’s like, “We’re towing the car, find a ride home.”

0:02:13.9 Jordan Syatt: And I remember I called my buddy Adam Pine, I was like, “Bro, I need you to come pick me up.” [laughter] But that was when I was like 23. I only have one lifetime accident, not my fault. I think I’m a pretty good driver. You’re gonna say I’m not a good driver because of the one incident when I turned off the sound on my Waze so that I could pay attention to the conversation, so I missed the exit. [laughter] But I’d say I’m a pretty good driver, but now you can… You have your… No, that’s it. You can…

[overlapping conversation]

0:02:43.1 Mike Vacanti: No, no, no, no, keep going. And then what happened?

0:02:45.2 Jordan Syatt: And that’s it.

0:02:46.1 Mike Vacanti: No, what happened. You missed the exit and then what?

0:02:47.4 Jordan Syatt: I don’t fully remember.

0:02:48.4 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, you do.

0:02:49.4 Jordan Syatt: I don’t fully remember. That’s what… [laughter]

0:02:51.7 Mike Vacanti: It was three days ago.

[laughter]

0:02:52.6 Jordan Syatt: You know my memory.

0:02:53.9 Mike Vacanti: You missed the exit and then… Which was completely reasonable. So then we turned around and came back, and then what happened?

0:03:04.3 Jordan Syatt: I almost missed the exit again coming back that way. I was so invested in our conversation.

0:03:11.5 Mike Vacanti: Stop, stop. No, no, no. Stick to the facts, Ben.

0:03:14.7 Jordan Syatt: That is the fact. [laughter]

0:03:15.3 Mike Vacanti: No, no, no. What… You almost missed the exit, but then you didn’t, so you quickly swerved. There’s like a… It’s not like a normal… It’s not a normal exit, it’s like two lanes here, two lanes here. And you were in this lane, and there’s like a cement blockade here. And you got in right in front of the cement blockade, although there happened to be a person in that lane. And I go “Jeez,” and then you swerve hard. It was a… Look, it happens. It happens. [laughter] But I said something along the lines of like, I don’t remember what I said, I asked you about your driving and you were like, “This is definitely gonna make it on the podcast,” and I said, “Yes, it is.”

0:03:55.9 Jordan Syatt: I knew it, I knew it. Yeah, what do you think? Am I a good driver or no, based on your brief experience in my car?

0:04:01.6 Mike Vacanti: I’m not even gonna base it on that, I’m gonna base it on your personality, you’re someone who needs a lot of stimulation.

0:04:11.4 Jordan Syatt: I don’t text and drive. I don’t do that.

0:04:13.6 Mike Vacanti: No, no, no. No, I don’t think you do.

0:04:15.1 Jordan Syatt: I don’t look at Instagram while I’m driving. I’m vehemently against that. [laughter]

0:04:21.4 Mike Vacanti: That’s something that people get cancelled for these days, huh? I actually remember what I was gonna say last episode, which was talking about the current state of comment sections on social media, comparing 2023 to 2015, so we should definitely do that here, that would be fun.

0:04:35.9 Jordan Syatt: Okay. Yeah, let’s do it.

0:04:36.9 Mike Vacanti: But just knowing your need for stimulation, it seems like it’d be boring to just drive 5 or 8 over, 10 over in the lane, not changing lanes a lot, just looking straight ahead, not looking at the tree or the sign or the bird, or whatever is going on, looking at other people in the car, but just to pay attention and drive for 20-30 minutes, seems like it’d be something that wouldn’t come naturally.

0:05:04.6 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, it’s very challenging for me.

0:05:07.4 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

0:05:08.8 Jordan Syatt: That’s why I usually call you while I’m driving. I need some interaction.

0:05:10.4 Mike Vacanti: Extra stimulation to…

0:05:11.8 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, but if no one is picking up the phone, I’m in big trouble. Dude, I don’t know if I’ve ever told you this story. So when I went to the University of Delaware, I would drive to and from the University of Delaware when I was at the beginning of the semester, at the end of the semester, I would drive to and from for Thanksgiving. And I was driving by myself. And it was like a seven hour drive.

0:05:30.0 Mike Vacanti: It’s not fun.

0:05:32.0 Jordan Syatt: And this is before I didn’t have Instagram or anything and all of that, but I still had my same personality in terms of needing that stimulation, and so I would call all my friends and call Adam Pine, I’d call… Wait, did I… No, I don’t know. I didn’t… No, I didn’t know Adam Pine at the time, so I wasn’t calling Adam. I was calling my buddy Dave, and I would calling my mom, whatever it is, my family in Israel. But eventually, after seven hours, you’re left on your own, there’s no one you can talk to. So have I told you this story, what I used to do?

0:06:00.8 Mike Vacanti: No.

0:06:03.3 Jordan Syatt: Bro, I used to call random numbers. I would dial like a random number. I would have no idea who I’m calling. And I don’t know, 50% of the time someone would pick up and be like, “Hello?” And I’d be like, “Hey, how’s it going?” And they’d be like, “Who is this?” And I would say… This is a true story. My goal was to try and have a real conversation with people that I didn’t know, and so I would be like, “Listen, my name is Jordan. I’m driving back from the University of Delaware. I’m just looking for someone to have a conversation.” [laughter] And 95% of the time they just hang up immediately. I had some real amazing conversations with people who I didn’t know. Only a handful. It wasn’t a lot, but a small… There were a handful of people who I would just talk to for 45 minutes on the drive home.

0:06:56.9 Mike Vacanti: So that’s unbelievable. I almost don’t… I believe you, but I can’t believe that it…

0:07:04.7 Jordan Syatt: I swear on my life.

0:07:06.6 Mike Vacanti: I believe you. This reminds me of when I asked you if you ever are just on an airplane late at night flying, like looking out the window and just plotting and planning, and thinking about your life. And I was gonna say, you ever sit there for like 45 minutes and you’re like “45 minutes?? I thought you were gonna say 45 seconds and I don’t even do that. What…?”

[laughter]

0:07:26.4 Mike Vacanti: I’m very curious ’cause there’s sayings about… And this obviously varies from person to person, but how people have a very rich inner world or inner dialogues, inner monologue, like to think, like to be in their own head, what happens if you are just in… Or is that maybe based on MBTI and personality type, you just don’t even spend time in your own head, that’s just not the way your brain works, I don’t know.

0:07:57.4 Jordan Syatt: When I’m spending time in my own head, it’s usually planning, so I’ll be planning for something. I’ll be planning a strategy, I’ll be planning… Right now, last night, for example, I was planning, ’cause I wanna build this whole jujitsu business thing that I’ve told you about. So there’s a lot of planning, maybe I should do… I’m coming up with ideas. And then the way that my personality works is as soon as I have an idea, I jump on it, like, let’s go. Let’s do this, let’s do that. Let’s make this poster. For example, last night I was on ChatGPT for like 45 minutes, just coming up with different ideas and trying to learn how to use it better, which I think I’m getting a good handle on it. It’s pretty insane, but if there is nothing that I can do to take action when I’m driving, then at that point I’m like, “All right, well, I can’t do anything,” so I can have all these plans and stuff, but just thinking about it doesn’t really do anything for me. So then I’ll just… It’s very difficult for me to just sit there and philosophize or whatever it is.

0:08:58.4 Mike Vacanti: So when you call a random person, you’re trying to get better at talking to people?

0:09:06.4 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, I was literally… The goal was, can I get my point across and make them like me quickly enough to where they see the reason to stay on the phone with me and just talk? And then we have a legit conversation and it’s very nice, but there was a goal there, like, how can I get what I need to get across within 15 to 24 seconds of this phone call to where this person is like, “Oh, you know what, he seems pretty genuine and let’s just have… Let’s just go. I’ll give him another minute, I’ll give him another minute.” That was the goal. So yeah, it was like, let’s just see if I could do it, and it was fun.

0:09:43.1 Mike Vacanti: Interesting.

0:09:44.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Far more fun than just being in my head.

0:09:47.2 Mike Vacanti: I’m guessing that no one has ever done that before. I think you’re the only person that’s ever called random numbers on a long road trip just to talk and try to keep them on the phone. I truly don’t think that’s ever happened.

0:10:02.8 Jordan Syatt: People have done prank calls, but no one’s legitimately tried to have real conversations with random people.

0:10:08.5 Mike Vacanti: Correct. Just to fill boredom. Yeah. I called everyone who I know by the way, I’d be exhausted if I talked to everyone, and then the next thing you’re like, oh, there’s no more people. I’m dialing random numbers.

[laughter]

0:10:22.3 Jordan Syatt: You would just be burned out, you’d be like, “Oh God.”

0:10:26.1 Mike Vacanti: Dude.

0:10:27.4 Jordan Syatt: “Finally peace and quiet.”

0:10:27.6 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, yeah.

0:10:30.7 Jordan Syatt: When you drive, do you listen to music or podcast or you’re just silent?

0:10:32.9 Mike Vacanti: As I mentioned at the end of the last episode, the internet has ruined my brain. And so now, I infrequently drive in silence because I realize how good it is for me, and I really enjoy it when I do, but usually audio book, podcast or music.

0:10:52.6 Jordan Syatt: Okay. What’s like the most common, audio book, podcast or music?

0:10:58.4 Mike Vacanti: Probably podcast.

0:10:58.7 Jordan Syatt: Any good ones?

0:11:00.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Yeah, lots of good ones. Should we go through ’em?

0:11:05.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, who do you listen to? Do you know who I’ve really liked recently is Russell Brand.

0:11:07.7 Mike Vacanti: Russell Brand is absolutely brilliant.

0:11:10.4 Jordan Syatt: I think he’s one of the greatest speakers of our generation. He never says umm. He’s so articulate and well-spoken. And his vernacular. It’s unbelievable, love that guy. But who are you listening to?

0:11:24.1 Mike Vacanti: I listen to the All-In podcast weekly, and then there’s a handful where I’ll look and see who the guest is and listen once every so often depending on the guest, and that’s… I have here Rogan, my boy Danny Miranda, My First Million, Peter Attia. Those are the big ones.

0:11:52.9 Jordan Syatt: Got it.

0:11:56.7 Mike Vacanti: Calling random numbers, that’s…

0:12:00.7 Jordan Syatt: I can’t believe I never told you that before. [laughter]

0:12:00.7 Mike Vacanti: That’s just rich. That’s…

0:12:01.9 Jordan Syatt: I told my mom that once, she was like, “What are you doing?” [laughter]

0:12:08.6 Mike Vacanti: I’m not that surprised. Should we dive into… Oh, do you wanna talk about comment sections?

0:12:16.2 Jordan Syatt: Sure, I don’t know where you’re going with it.

0:12:17.9 Mike Vacanti: Well, the other day we were talking, we can cut this if we want or not go down this road?

0:12:23.0 Jordan Syatt: No, no, no. Let’s do it.

0:12:23.9 Mike Vacanti: But you were like, “fucking comment sections,” ’cause you had posted something and there were like, I don’t know, three to eight people who were just being contrarian for the sake of being contrarian in the comment section.

0:12:35.6 Jordan Syatt: I’m trying to remember which post it was. Let me look at… Oh, wait. I think it was the french fry post.

0:12:38.2 Mike Vacanti: It was about a shoulder…

[overlapping conversation]

0:12:40.7 Mike Vacanti: No. Well, yeah, there was that, but then there was the shoulder press.

0:12:42.5 Jordan Syatt: Oh, it was the shoulder press. Yeah.

0:12:44.2 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, and then we were romanticized in 2015 comment sections, which were amazing.

0:12:51.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah, it’s so interesting. I think it’s… You know why? I think it’s because there are a couple of things. I think number one is, sometimes people who don’t follow you will find your post randomly and they’ll just vehemently disagree with it for whatever reason, and then because they don’t know you and they’ve got so much time on their hands, they’re just gonna leave a comment, a mean, stupid comment, whatever it is, whereas back in 2015, I think it was number one, social media was still so relatively new. People were afraid to be like just outrageously rude to someone they don’t know. They were like, well, this isn’t right, I’m not supposed to do that. And then also, you were mainly seeing people that you knew at that time, and so you weren’t gonna just be a dick to someone that you know.

0:13:38.2 Mike Vacanti: And if you don’t know them in real life, people you follow, like you’re seeing their content ’cause you wanna see their content, it’s not coming across in some form or this is the first time you’ve ever seen that person.

0:13:47.5 Jordan Syatt: Right, exactly. Yeah, so… Oh, did I tell you what happened with that guy who had all the anti-Semitic shit in my DMs? I know I told you a little bit, there was the guy who was sending me the terrible, awful, anti-Semitic stuff.

0:14:04.4 Mike Vacanti: And then he apologized.

0:14:06.2 Jordan Syatt: I’m blasting him. So at first we had a strong back and forth where he was just trying to justify what he was saying, da, da, da, da.

0:14:16.3 Mike Vacanti: Oh you didn’t post that part.

0:14:16.4 Jordan Syatt: No, I was like, whatever. I already did my job. I blasted him, I don’t need anymore, I’m not gonna keep bashing. I don’t like when people just… I don’t want people to just keep elongating this stuff. Listen, and so I said what I needed to say. This was beyond inappropriate and disgusting, so I don’t need to keep berating people with how stupid this guy is.

0:14:36.2 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. And for people who didn’t see it, he’s like “gas chamber,” “you fucking Jew” non-stop.

0:14:46.1 Jordan Syatt: “Entitled Jew,” posted a picture my daughter. Just like Jew, just weird stuff. So we have that probably an hour, maybe a 30-minute, 30-minute back and forth with him just trying to defend it. I invite him on my podcast, and I was like, “Hey, I have an idea. How about we come on my podcast, you can give your side of the story and you can try and educate thousands and thousands of people with what you’re saying.” And then he was just like, “No, whatever, I don’t wanna do that, blah, blah, blah.” I was like, “Cool, fine,” that was it. Probably within about 90 minutes, I get another message being like, “Hey, man, I made a big mistake. I’m really sorry.” And I was like, “What are you talking about?” And he was like, “I’ve realized that… ” And I know he definitely got messages from my followers, but what he said was I was very impressed, he was like, “Listen, the truth is I’m a very unhappy person, and I took it out on someone who’s more successful and helping more people than I am, and I apologize.” And the reason I was impressed is because he could have just said an apology to get me to take it down and to stop people from messaging him. It was a very…

0:15:55.1 Jordan Syatt: Unless he was Dale-ing me, which he could have, but it was very introspective, and so I ended up taking it down, putting that apology up, and he continued to message me for the last three days every day. Basically just being like, “Man, I feel so bad for what I did. I’m really sorry, it opened my… ” Every day he’s messaging me. On my birthday, he was like, “Brother, I hope you have an amazing birthday.” [laughter] Again, just going over the top. And I’m being like, “Man, thank you so much, I appreciate it.” But I thought that was such a unique experience to have. Where someone’s coming… I don’t think he knew what he was fully understood the depth to which he was sinking to when he had that anti-Semitic stuff, but then once it was brought to his attention and he could really have some more introspection, it’s been… He’s been nothing but wonderful.

0:16:48.4 Mike Vacanti: You’d think him getting hog piled on for an hour was like woke him up.

0:16:53.2 Jordan Syatt: I think that’s… I don’t think it would have changed if that wasn’t part of it, for sure, but… So for example, I think that was a huge part of it, but I also know many other people would have gotten hog piled on and they would have just blocked everybody and just continue to believe what they believe, and dug their heels in deeper and gone into the forums that are all about that stuff and just found the people who agreed with what they were saying. Whereas for whatever reason, this guy went the complete opposite direction, which I thought was super interesting, so yeah. But I know this just on the topic of comment sections and people sending weird shit, so yeah.

0:17:30.2 Mike Vacanti: Real quick. Do you remember your agreeableness rating on the Big Five personality test?

0:17:36.8 Jordan Syatt: I don’t. I don’t even remember taking that test.

0:17:40.5 Mike Vacanti: It says a lot about the all nighters of the 2017 to 2019 era.

[laughter]

0:17:45.7 Mike Vacanti: I don’t even remember taking that test.

0:17:46.1 Jordan Syatt: Did I take that test?

0:17:47.7 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. We both did.

0:17:49.3 Jordan Syatt: What’s your agreeableness this level?

0:17:51.6 Mike Vacanti: I’m more disagreeable, but not like… I’m not like the boss takes pleasure in firing people. I’m not that level of disagreeable. I think I’m…

0:18:00.7 Jordan Syatt: You’re definitely more disagreeable than I am.

0:18:01.9 Mike Vacanti: I don’t think I am, dude. That’s where I was going with it, is you actively want… But I’m definitely not more disagreeable with. You love confrontation.

0:18:11.8 Jordan Syatt: Dude, you’re way more disagreeable.

0:18:12.9 Mike Vacanti: Absolutely not.

0:18:14.0 Jordan Syatt: Dude, you have no problem saying like… Maybe it depends on the situation where if it’s something that is like that, I have no problem getting into it with someone, but I feel like you’re… So wait… In other situations, you have no problem, you’re like, “No, this is what I want. Just do this.” You know what I mean?

[laughter]

0:18:35.0 Mike Vacanti: You know what, I know what you’re talking about things like scheduling a podcast, for example. I think maybe it’s the public-facing nature of it, so if it’s an argument in the comment section or if it’s getting on a podcast and debating someone, you enjoy the winning aspect of it.

0:18:54.8 Jordan Syatt: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.

0:18:56.5 Mike Vacanti: Got it. So it’s not necessarily that you’re seeking disagreement, it’s that you’re seeking victory.

0:19:02.0 Jordan Syatt: Well, no, no. There’s I’m seeking victory and education.

0:19:06.6 Mike Vacanti: Of course, you’re… The people who are reading it are going yes.

0:19:09.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. There’s a competitive aspect to it.

0:19:11.4 Mike Vacanti: I think your agreeableness was like eight.

0:19:15.1 Jordan Syatt: How does the score function?

0:19:18.7 Mike Vacanti: A hundred to one and…

0:19:18.8 Jordan Syatt: And the closer to one, the more disagreeable you are?

0:19:22.4 Mike Vacanti: No. Or… Yes, yes. It might have been the other way around. I don’t remember.

0:19:27.7 Jordan Syatt: Dude, I feel like you’re super disagreeable.

0:19:29.6 Mike Vacanti: I don’t think so. I actually know that I’m not. I know that I’m just somewhat disagreeable. I think you’re super…

0:19:35.2 Jordan Syatt: You are being pretty disagreeable right now. [laughter]

0:19:36.4 Mike Vacanti: And that’s because I know the answer.

[laughter]

0:19:46.1 Mike Vacanti: Any practical words around comment sections in the current era?

0:19:51.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, here’s what I think. I think of it like imagine when you go in public now, and I think people are more aware of this now than ever, especially if you have a large audience, but even if you don’t. Everything you do when you go out is on camera, everything. You are not private ever. Even in your own home, there’s stuff that’s being recorded and what not on on your phone, but I’m talking about in public, you go out, cameras everywhere. Everything like…

0:20:22.9 Mike Vacanti: By who? By who?

0:20:25.2 Jordan Syatt: Don’t get me started on that, Michael. [laughter]

0:20:27.7 Mike Vacanti: Which government organization?

0:20:30.1 Jordan Syatt: Every government organization. Oh, dude, we didn’t even talk about JFK.

0:20:32.7 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, I just realized that.

0:20:35.4 Jordan Syatt: We didn’t even talk about that, that’s not for this podcast. Well, maybe later on, but anyway, you’re very well aware when you go out in public, we see videos online all the time, whether it’s on an airplane, someone’s freaking out and someone takes out their phone and starts filming, or in a parking lot, someone’s doing whatever. There’s always eyes on you, always. That is even more pronounced in your own comment section because it’s your comment section, there are always eyes on you, and I think it’s very easy to get caught up in you think you’re only debating or arguing with the person that left the mean comment. In reality, you’re putting on a show for everybody else who’s watching that comment section, and it is the most important thing for you is to not look like an ass hole in that comment section the most…

0:21:29.3 Jordan Syatt: You’re not trying to debate the person, this is a really important concept to understand, you’re not trying to actually win against that person, you’re trying to teach the people watching and reading the conversation the truth, and so as you’re going at it with that person, you have to remember the goal is not to win, the goal is to educate the other people reading it. And when you switch, when you shift the mentality from trying to win to trying to educate other people who will read this, your responses completely change. The tone completely changes, the overall point that you’re trying to get across is probably the exact same, but the way in which you say it and the open-mindedness, no one ever looks good when they’re being an asshole, you don’t look good when you’re being rude and snarky, you don’t.

0:22:20.6 Jordan Syatt: You look amazing when you can be kind and respectful and also get your point across, and when you’re really trying to teach people the correct way, unfortunately, the truth isn’t always enough. You need to win them to your side as well, and to win them to your side is to be the bigger person, is to treat them with respect and to be kind about it. So that’s probably the best piece of advice I can give if someone’s… Whether you’re doing the, what’s that, the $1.80 strategy, where you’re commenting on someone else’s post and you’re trying to get engagement that way or on your own posts, don’t be a dick. Always be kind and nice and factual, and be aware that people are watching and that’s who you’re really trying to have the conversation with.

0:23:07.3 Mike Vacanti: Two things, you said some interesting. You said to win them to your side, you need to act a certain way. Do you often win people to your side who are hostile in comment sections?

0:23:19.5 Jordan Syatt: I’m not trying to win the person I’m arguing with.

0:23:22.9 Mike Vacanti: Oh, I see. You got it.

0:23:23.3 Jordan Syatt: I’m trying to win the people reading.

0:23:26.1 Mike Vacanti: Yes, yeah, yeah. Okay, that makes complete sense. And two, is this different for you if you’re battling it out in the DMs?

0:23:32.6 Jordan Syatt: It used to be. Now it isn’t because I know anyone can screenshot it and post it up, every conversation is always publicly available. So…

0:23:42.1 Mike Vacanti: Of course, you still want… You’re still behaving under the assumption that this could be public, but are you also trying to win?

0:23:50.0 Jordan Syatt: It’s funny, now, whenever those DMs come in, I often use it as an opportunity to… Okay, that… If I get a DM that pisses me off, I have an initial gut reaction of anger and then the immediate next reaction is I can use this as a learning opportunity, I can use this as an educational post, I can share this on my story. So rather than me immediately replying out of frustration or anger or impulse, I wait. I think how can I reply to this? So that when I post it on my story, it will resonate with more people and that will help educate them and also ironically, it also helps the conversation go better as well with the actual person, but every interaction I have is, how can I use this interaction in a public way to help educate those who already follow me or those who might be on the fence about what they believe on this topic? So yeah, it’s always a learning opportunity.

0:24:49.8 Mike Vacanti: I’m gonna give two other options because I think you’re somewhat unique in your crowd work comedian-like ability to dish and take and go back and forth and put on a performance that is simultaneously educating. I think you’re really, really good at it in the 99th percentile. The Joe Rogan or the GaryVee approaches would be, “Don’t touch it,” like Rogan just post and ghost, don’t engage with comments, or Gary’s one-off shorter type of response that is just feeling empathy and compassion for that person and literally just wishing them well in the face of whatever they’re throwing at you.

0:25:36.9 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, I think the only reason that I’ll…

0:25:40.3 Mike Vacanti: I know you don’t like either of those, but I’m just offering those as two solutions for people who aren’t going to spend hours debating people in a comment section.

0:25:48.8 Jordan Syatt: The only reason I’m gonna push back on that is because I think what Gary did before he was huge was actually closer to what I do now, and I think Rogan is that unique person who maybe he never was in the comments section, I don’t know. But Rogan doesn’t need to. And Gary doesn’t even need to anymore, and his strategy has changed over the years. I think when you’re working with a smaller audience, it actually, it’s… You don’t need to be funny, you don’t need to have comedic humor, but I think it’s a mistake not to engage in your comments section with people who are pushing back on you. I think it’s a huge mistake because it’s another… If you’re trying to be… To show people that you can help them and you’re the coach, and then you have a comment section with four comments on it, and one of them is a long one, completely disagreeing with you, and you reply to the other ones, but you ignore that, I don’t think that looks good. I think…

0:26:49.8 Mike Vacanti: If it’s a well-in… If it’s like if they’re debating the content and they’re well-intentioned, absolutely. But the majority of bad comments aren’t well-intentioned debating like what you’re saying in the post, they’re… I can give plenty of examples, personal attacks, just not coming from a place of genuine discussion.

0:27:16.9 Jordan Syatt: If someone’s doing personal attacks, I think you have two really good options. Number one, is delete and block. I have no time, mental energy, emotional energy for that type of shit. So delete and block, I don’t need it. The other option is like you were… The Gary’s method, which is just like, listen. I don’t know if you’re having a bad day or what but I’m sending you love and I hope everything is okay. That’s an amazing route. But if we’re talking about someone actually talking about the points that you’re making, things that you’re saying that are wrong, for example, there’s a… When I posted the video of The Rock and I was showing his 20-pound lateral raises.

0:27:52.4 Mike Vacanti: That was another one of them.

0:27:53.0 Jordan Syatt: There was a guy who was like… He was like, “I don’t know what you’re talking about, he’s using momentum like crazy, da, da, da.” And basically I went in, I was like, “Listen, the truth is he’s not using momentum.” He’s like, “This is a very common technique that he’s using, it might look that way, but he’s not, he’s controlling significantly on the way down,” and I gave a clear concise response without being rude. So if it’s someone who’s attacking you personally, you should feel no shame in deleting and blocking whatsoever, but if it’s about the actual content and they’re being at least somewhat respectful, I don’t like the idea of not responding, especially with a smaller audience.

0:28:31.7 Mike Vacanti: Makes sense. Depends on the nature of the comment and where the person’s coming from.

0:28:36.1 Jordan Syatt: 100%.

0:28:39.5 Mike Vacanti: So much of fitness is now religious, meaning like a vegan coming after you for saying something about eating animal protein that is not… I mean, sure, you can… Again, you can put on a show, but you have no chance at “converting” that person in that. It’s similar to like someone who’s on the far left coming at you about a political topic and then you trying to sway them to the other side. It’s just not going to happen.

0:29:09.6 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah, exactly. And that’s why I like reminding myself, it’s not about convincing the person I’m debating, it’s for the people who are watching.

0:29:20.0 Mike Vacanti: And I think you’re uniquely elite at your ability to do that.

0:29:24.7 Jordan Syatt: Well, I’ve learned from many mistakes, that is for sure.

[laughter]

0:29:32.5 Mike Vacanti: Q and A?

0:29:32.6 Jordan Syatt: Let’s do it. You want me to pull it up?

0:29:35.0 Mike Vacanti: Pull her up.

0:29:35.0 Jordan Syatt: Okay, so here’s an interesting question. I don’t know if you’re gonna wanna go on on this, but it’s something that… The question is actually great, I like the question, but it’s making me think about something I’ve seen in the last few weeks on social media that has been pissing me off and I’m gonna… We can talk about it. So this person asked a great question, not upset at all with this question. “Would a weekly step goal work like a weekly calorie goal, would you get the same heart health benefit?” So basically, what Mike and I have spoken about many, many times, we’ve done with thousands of clients is you break down your client’s calorie goal, instead of saying, “Hey, you get 2000 calories a day, you get 14,000 calories per week,” and then you break that up over however you want.

0:30:21.4 Jordan Syatt: So maybe some days are 1400 calories, other days are 2400 calories, whatever it is. When you break the calorie goal up weekly, it can be a little bit more easy to stick to and you can individualize a day-to-day ’cause not every day is the same. So this person is asking, could you do that with your steps, maybe some days get 2,000 steps, other days get 18,000 steps, whatever it is, and would you get the same heart health benefit? So we can talk about that for… We can talk about that. But the thing that I’ve seen recently, there’s a, and I put this in quotes, “a study” that came out, I’m not a huge fan of the methods of the study, but basically saying the whole getting… You know there’s the whole debate around 10,000 steps and be like, “Well, you don’t need 10,000 steps,” actually 7500 is where the benefits really are, which I agree with. It’s correct, you don’t need 10,000. 7500 is, I think, a good one to shoot for from a…

0:31:12.0 Mike Vacanti: Sorry. The big meta-analysis from 18 months ago?

0:31:18.8 Jordan Syatt: 16,000, yeah.

0:31:19.8 Mike Vacanti: Well no, but it was that every 1000 or every 2000 leads to additional benefit all the way. I don’t remember if it was 16 or 18, but all the way up to… That doesn’t mean that should be everyone’s daily target.

0:31:30.5 Jordan Syatt: Correct.

0:31:31.1 Mike Vacanti: But there is additional benefit in continuing to go past 10,000.

0:31:33.5 Jordan Syatt: There is. There is. It’s not there aren’t tremendous benefits from 7500 to 10,000, but there are more benefits, especially from a physiological health perspective, but even just getting 7500 is really where… That’s I think the minimum people should be shooting for on a day-to-day basis. That’s where the benefits are. You get the most benefits with the least amount of extra work. Well, a new “study” can… Again, I put study in quotes ’cause it’s more of like an observational thing that I think is actually more politically motivated than health-motivated, saying to the effect of, well, not only do you not need 10,000 steps a day, you don’t even need 7500 steps a day. What you could just do is get 7,000 steps three days a week, maybe it was 8,000, either 7000 or 8000 steps three days a week, and that is all you need. And this is fucking pissing me off because for…

0:32:26.1 Jordan Syatt: I feel like people are just trying to find ways to appease the people who are not getting their steps and who are not doing the work on a day-to-day basis. This is an appeasement strategy, not an actual health promotion strategy. This is where people are like, “Listen, first we said 10,000 steps,” and granted there were some flaws with that, but people couldn’t do that, so we dropped it to 7500, which is frankly more accurate, but now people are having trouble getting 7500 steps a day. So you know what, actually all you need to do is get 7500 steps a day three days a week. And that’s plenty. And I’m like, “You are out of your fucking mind.” And I’ve seen that and I haven’t spoken about it yet publicly, and I’ve been meaning to. It’s like…

0:33:10.6 Mike Vacanti: Where did it come from?

0:33:12.5 Jordan Syatt: I don’t know. Off the top of my head, I’m not sure.

0:33:15.8 Mike Vacanti: Why do you feel like it’s political?

0:33:17.3 Jordan Syatt: Political in that… Maybe political wasn’t the right word. I think it’s more of an appeasement strategy geared towards making people feel less bad about themselves, rather than doing what they need to do to improve their health. It’s like rather than saying like, “Hey,” the truth is you need to do this on a daily basis for as consistently as you possibly can to get the most health benefits, instead of saying now that they’re like, “Oh, well just do it a couple of days and you’ll still be fine.” No, we know for a fact that is not accurate, and I think people were upset about the 16,000 steps, they’re upset about the 10,000 steps, they’re upset about the 7500 daily. It’s like they’re just looking for ways to get people to not feel bad, which I understand you don’t want people to feel bad, but we also have to be honest, and we can’t sacrifice the truth in order to try and just make people feel better about not walking four days a week, what are you doing?

0:34:14.7 Mike Vacanti: Look, you can follow that strategy, but then don’t be surprised when you don’t feel as good, when you have lesser health outcomes over the long run.

0:34:28.1 Jordan Syatt: And it’s one of… Walking is one of those things where… And this might get more to actually answering the question at hand, which is a weekly step goal. Does that work like a calorie weekly goal? I would rather say, “Hey, let’s start with walking 4000 or 3000 steps every day,” than just saying, “Well, let’s just do three days of this.” Walking and just movement in general is one of those things you should do it every single day, period, end of story. I don’t think that unless you’re really sick or something is terrible is going on in your life, whatever it is, I don’t see justifications for not moving. If you’re really sick, you’re laid up in bed, great that… Not great, but rest. Absolutely. But the vast majority of the time, you should be moving every day, and it’s just… It blows my mind that there are people out there saying like, “No, you actually don’t just… You cannot move four days a week, basically, and just get all of them in on three days a week,” Like, what the… Rather than… I can’t even talk about it. It just pisses me off.

0:35:31.5 Mike Vacanti: Not to mention it’s 7000, three days a week, 20… You’re only taking 3000 steps a day. It’s… Yeah, I don’t know what the intent of that article would be, or that research or whatever it was, it’s not optimal. We know this and…

0:35:50.7 Jordan Syatt: It’s nowhere… It is severely sub-optimal.

0:35:55.3 Mike Vacanti: In terms of the actual question, I actually… Look, it’s technically correct that what matters for fat loss is your weekly calorie intake. That’s technically true. You have a 1000 one day, you have 2000 the next day, you average 1500, yes. I actually don’t love weekly budgets, there are certain circumstances where they make sense. On an individual level, the time when the conversation often comes up, or the times when I don’t like it is when someone overeats maybe a day or two days, and then they want to offset that damage by thinking about, okay, but I’m still okay for the week, so I can restrict for this number of days. It’s like, look, if you had a hard time even hitting your target for a few days, then you wanna go a few days going way under your current target. I much prefer the approach of simply getting right back on track rather than trying to offset damage, and I like this approach across the board. Like, oh, you missed a workout, no, don’t try and squeeze five workouts in the next week instead of four because you missed a workout, simply get right back on track, shift everything back a day, but simply get right back on track is a way better strategy than trying to compensate for “damage.” So in the step count example, I think the…

0:37:20.0 Mike Vacanti: I think that if you give someone a weekly… So yes, your weekly step count, actually, I don’t even know if it’s true, in the same sense that calories are true, we can talk about that, but the same slippery slope mentality exists of, “Okay, I can take 2000 steps a day for these three days because I’m playing a ton of video games and all my friends are online, and I’m really having a good time and I’ll make up for it, like Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.” I don’t like that approach because then you’re giving yourself… You’re making life harder for future you and easier for current you, and I just think a better strategy across the board, whether it’s work, nutrition, fitness, like take care of today, focus on today, do your best today. You can still be balanced, you can still do the fun thing you were gonna do but also go get some steps in in this example, and then worry about tomorrow, tomorrow, but don’t put off plowing the fields until the last couple of days, do a little bit each day. I just think this applies to everything in life.

0:38:20.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, Noah didn’t start building ark once the flood happened.

0:38:22.0 Mike Vacanti: There you go. There’s the analogy.

0:38:23.0 Jordan Syatt: The ark was built once…

0:38:26.8 Mike Vacanti: Yes, yes.

0:38:27.1 Jordan Syatt: It’s like you wanna start building it before you need it.

0:38:28.8 Mike Vacanti: Correct.

0:38:30.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. To be fair to the person, she did say, “Do you get the same heart health benefits?” It was less about weight loss for her and more about heart, and I don’t have the research on hand to support this, but I can confidently say it’s not the same heart health benefits. Energy balance is what dictates fat gain and fat loss. Heart health, in the same… Your heart is a muscle, your muscles are obviously muscles, the impact on your muscles is what you need to get stronger to build bigger muscles, to improve your cardiovascular health is very different than what you need to gain fat or lose fat. Energy balance works on a… What people often don’t understand about energy balance about fat gain and fat loss is you’re constantly in a state of fluctuating between lipogenesis and lipolysis, you are constantly fluctuating between gaining fat and losing fat, always. When you eat, you are now gaining fat in a very short window, once you start eating food, it’s on spikes, you are no longer burning fat, you’re now… You’re essentially storing fat at this point, but if you do this, if you zoom out now and not just on one meal, but you zoom over a week and you look at total energy balance over the week, cool.

0:39:53.7 Jordan Syatt: Now, you can say you’ve net lost fat as a result of your total energy balance. I don’t think the same thing can be said for effect of heart health when we’re looking at different modes of exercise. I don’t think you can walk 70,000 steps one day and then do nothing for the rest of the week and think that you’re gonna get the same heart health benefits. I don’t think that’s how it works, not to mention the heart is just one component of this. The heart is just one component of the greater system as a whole, we’re looking at your muscles, you’re looking at glycogen storage, you’re looking at the effects on your tendons, you ligaments, your joints, your muscles. The mental health, the emotional health. There’s so many aspects of this that like, cool, let’s say you do that 70,000 steps once a week.

0:40:41.0 Jordan Syatt: Well, your joints are probably gonna be hurting like a motherfucker, that your feet are probably gonna be really hurting, that’s gonna affect the other things you do, it’s gonna affect your work, it’s gonna affect your relationships, it’s like one of the reasons we’re doing this is we’re trying to balance it. We live in a very different time than humans originated in, and essentially like we’re trying to get the exercise that our ancestors naturally got throughout the day. And I think what we’re trying to do is, as much as we can evenly space it to optimize all aspects of our life, not go too hard one day and then nothing at all the next day, not to go overboard here and less here, it’s like, let’s just try and have as much balance as we can and well, maybe one day you’ll get 12,000 steps, another day, you’ll get 6000 steps, that happens. It’s not a problem at all.

0:41:32.3 Jordan Syatt: But to think… The scary part of the extreme it is where it’s like, All right, I’m gonna get 45,000 steps one day, 15,000 steps another day, and the rest I’m just gonna sit on my ass and do nothing. No, I do not think you get the same heart health benefits, and I think it would actually do more harm than good. It would be better than getting 500 steps for the week as a whole than not walking at all, but I don’t think having one or two days of high steps and four or five days of… Or six days of essentially zero steps is a good heart health strategy at all.

0:42:06.5 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. To be slightly more charitable, to the type of person who would stress about not hitting their exact daily step count every single day, like you just said, there are gonna be days you’re a bit under it, there are gonna be days you’re a bit over it. Does that net out? Yeah, it probably does, to be honest, like 7000 one day, 10,000, the next day, 7200, 9400. You don’t need to hit it exactly, it’s on the extremes where there’s 36, 48, 72 hours of very low activity followed by days of massive amounts of activity and calorie expenditure, that’s an area you don’t wanna go in, but if you’re stressing about making sure you’re right on the number every day, and some days you’re not, that’s okay. That’s how averages work. Some days you’re gonna be below it, some days you are gonna be above it.

0:42:54.9 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, that’s exactly right.

0:42:56.1 Mike Vacanti: Good question.

0:42:58.0 Jordan Syatt: Should I do one more?

0:43:00.1 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. We’ll do another question.

0:43:01.5 Jordan Syatt: Okay, here’s one. She wrote, “You know the seated row at the gym,” I believe she’s talking about the seated cable row, not the cardio machine, “how do I work those same muscles at home without that machine?”

0:43:18.6 Mike Vacanti: That’s a fun question.

0:43:18.6 Jordan Syatt: I knew you’d like that one.

0:43:21.0 Mike Vacanti: It’s really hard. It’s not the easiest move to replicate at home, and should we assume no equipment at home?

0:43:31.9 Jordan Syatt: Let’s assume that there’s enough to work those muscles.

0:43:36.1 Mike Vacanti: Cool.

0:43:37.6 Jordan Syatt: But we’ll talk about it all.

0:43:38.1 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, we’re talking about a horizontal pulling pattern, reaching overhead, a pull-up or a chin-up is a vertical pulling pattern, a lat pulldown, here you’re pulling horizontally towards your chest. The movements at home without weights where you could replicate it are like an inverted body weight row or a Let Me In. So if you happen to have a very stable table that you can go underneath, and so you’re laying down underneath the table, you’re reaching up, if you’re watching on YouTube, actually, we have video on Spotify too, but you reach out, you grab the table and you pull your chest toward the table, you’re hitting that same movement pattern as a seated cable row. A Let Me In is an easier version of that same movement pattern, probably best accomplished or you might have an idea on this, but throwing a bed sheet over a door and closing the door is a good way, and then you’re gripping the sheet, you’re standing a little more vertically. So it’s a little bit easier than the inverted row, but you’re holding the sheet, you’re standing, you’re leaning away from the door, and then you’re pulling the sheet towards your chest again and you can kinda angle it.

0:45:00.7 Mike Vacanti: The more upright your upper body is, the easier it’s gonna be, the more horizontal your body is to the ground, the more difficult that move is gonna be, and then if you have dumbbells, there’s many kinds of row variations that are similar, single arm row, bent row. Yeah.

0:45:21.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, if you have dumbbells, you’re fine. Dumbbell row, any variation of a dumbbell row, batwing row or a chest supported row, whatever you wanna call it, is a really good one as well. I think I agree with everything you said. The other thing I’ll say is, if there’s one piece of equipment that someone… If someone’s training from home, the first piece of equipment I encourage them to get a TRX, that’s like the number one, ’cause sometimes it’s really difficult to have at-home exercises that target your back.

0:45:56.5 Mike Vacanti: Yes.

0:45:57.5 Jordan Syatt: Especially if you don’t have dumbbells, it’s relatively easy to do pushing exercises, relatively, especially upper body pushing, but pulling motions, whether it’s vertical or horizontal at home can be really difficult if you don’t have dumbbells, and if you have dumbbells, you’re good. What’s cool though is for the TRX, you can also start doing more vertical stuff as well without needing a chin-up bar, you can do inverted rows on it, you can even do assisted type chin-up exercises with a TRX. And keep in mind, we’re not sponsored by TRX. I would love to be sponsored by TRX though. So you know if TRX is listening, if someone wants to forward this to TRX and say, “Hey, you wanna pay these guys to promote your shit, they’re already doing it.” I would… That’s one of the companies I would absolutely get paid to promote ’cause I love TRX.

0:46:38.9 Mike Vacanti: In the spirit of being authentic marketers, while Jordan’s would be promoting TRX, I’d say that I don’t think it’s a top four piece of at-home gym equipment. I still like the TRX.

0:46:50.0 Jordan Syatt: You don’t think so?

0:46:50.9 Mike Vacanti: No.

0:46:51.5 Jordan Syatt: Get out of here.

0:46:52.1 Mike Vacanti: No.

0:46:53.2 Jordan Syatt: All right. What’s top four?

0:46:54.5 Mike Vacanti: Adjustable dumbbells, by far number one. Number two is an adjustable bench, number three is a pull-up bar.

0:47:06.7 Jordan Syatt: More than a TRX? You’d get a pull-up bar before you get a TRX? Get out of here.

0:47:10.2 Mike Vacanti: You already have the dumbbells and the bench, you can… What can you do on a… What would you actually do on a TRX that you can’t do with adjustable dumbbells and a bench?

0:47:18.9 Jordan Syatt: Oh, bro. So much. Number one, with a TRX, you could do hamstring, you could do leg exercises with the TRX, you could do Bulgarian split squats with it, you could do hamstring curls with it, you could do core exercises with it, there’s a lot of stuff that you can’t do with the chin up bar that you can do with the TRX.

0:47:36.4 Mike Vacanti: You already have the adjustable bench and we can do Bulgarian split squats with our dumbbells and our bench. Why do we need the TRX for that?

0:47:42.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, but you can also do like ham… You can do hamstring curls on the TRX with a knee flexion-based hamstring curl as opposed to an RDL, which is the knee extended, so you can do that, you can do a lot of core base or you can do…

0:47:58.0 Mike Vacanti: Swiss ball, number four.

0:47:58.1 Jordan Syatt: You’re really going, “I don’t want that fucking TRX.” [laughter] The Swiss ball, I also agree. I would go dumbbells, bench, TRX, Swiss ball, 100%. That’s my top four.

0:48:11.4 Mike Vacanti: That’s a solid top four. And putting TRX 3, I can get behind that. I can get behind that.

0:48:16.1 Jordan Syatt: If I have someone who can already do chin-ups, great. We’ll use the chin-up bar, but considering most people that I work with, at least, cannot start doing chin-ups. Yeah, we’ll have the TRX inverted rows all day.

0:48:29.1 Mike Vacanti: Touché. Yes, that’s a… I agree with that.

0:48:33.1 Jordan Syatt: So TRX, the point being, if you wanna sponsor us, Mike would put you in his top four as well.

0:48:39.5 Mike Vacanti: Depending on the person.

0:48:40.9 Jordan Syatt: Maybe top five.

0:48:41.8 Mike Vacanti: Depending on the person.

0:48:42.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Depending on the person. And if Mike doesn’t wanna take the money that you would give us, then I will take that money.

[laughter]

0:48:55.3 Jordan Syatt: But yeah, yeah. So I don’t know. Oh yeah. How to work those muscles. Yeah. There’s so many, I think, but I agree. Number one is adjustable dumbbells, for sure. If you have adjustable dumbbells, you’re good no matter what, there’s just more than enough options there. And then the bed sheet one is super underrated and you just tie a knot at the end of the bed sheet, put it over the door, close the door, and you’ve got inverted rows. I was doing that when my wife and I, and daughter and I were all in Boston, and I was trying to do workouts at our Airbnb in Boston, that’s how I was doing my inverted rows.

0:49:28.5 Mike Vacanti: Nice.

0:49:29.1 Jordan Syatt: But don’t try and do pull-ups that way, ’cause you might tear the fucking door down.

[laughter]

0:49:34.3 Mike Vacanti: Good question.

0:49:35.4 Jordan Syatt: Is that it?

0:49:36.1 Mike Vacanti: I think that’s it, brother. Thank you very much for listening. If you’re not subscribed to our YouTube, @personaltrainerpodcast over there, we would very much appreciate your subscription. Have a great day. Weekly uploads.

0:49:50.3 Jordan Syatt: See ya.